5 ways Whole Foods builds awareness on Pinterest

The supermarket chain hasn’t just created a few boards and posted a few pictures. It collaborates with other brands, creates content, and pulls in people who wouldn’t otherwise pay attention.

From December 2011 to January 2012, unique visitors to Pinterest grew 155 percent. It’s got more monthly usage than Google+, Twitter, and LinkedIn combined. People spend an average of 77 minutes there, compared with 10 on Facebook.

Even with all those people spending a lot of time there, just jumping on and pinning pictures won’t create a vibrant community of followers and collaborators. You’ve got to do things systematically, Bepko offered, as he shared some key points that have made Whole Foods’ Pinterest efforts such a success.

1. Community building

Over the past year and a half—Whole Foods joined Pinterest in mid-2011—the brand has looked for ways to tie social media into some of its video series. Bepko specifically pointed out one series on urban farming and another about do-it-yourself projects using household items. Neither series focused specifically on the Whole Foods brand; each aimed to tie Whole Foods to a certain type of food culture.

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